


If everything went wrong

by siren_of_the_ocean



Series: Tim Drake AU's [23]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, Red Robin (Comics)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, BAMF Tim Drake, Canonical Character Death, Discussion of Death, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Grieving Tim Drake, Hurt/Comfort, Multiverse, Multiverse Travel, Non-Canonical Character Death, Tim Drake Angst, Tim Drake Needs a Hug, Tim Drake is Red Robin, Tim Drake-centric, Two Tim Drakes, lots of death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-07
Updated: 2021-01-07
Packaged: 2021-03-18 01:08:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,593
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28609596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/siren_of_the_ocean/pseuds/siren_of_the_ocean
Summary: What if everything went wrong?What if Kon and Bart never came back? What if people kept dropping like flies?Tim meets an alternate version of himself who has lost everything.
Relationships: Bart Allen & Tim Drake, Bart Allen & Tim Drake & Kon-El | Conner Kent & Cassie Sandsmark, Tim Drake & Cassie Sandsmark, Tim Drake & Kon-El | Conner Kent
Series: Tim Drake AU's [23]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1853161
Comments: 16
Kudos: 162





	If everything went wrong

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this in like the span of 2 hours s if there are typing mistakes or anything, please just let me know. 
> 
> I might also be going into a writing frenzy because I can't work on my WIP Bat in a Flash.

There has to be a place. There has to

Xxxxxxxx

Tim didn’t expect to meet an alternate version of himself. He tends to avoid alternates since Batman with Guns showed up so many years ago.  
This version though. He seems different. 

The red and black of the uniform are familiar. The bandoleers and the gloves.   
Jason may have designed the uniform for Red Robin but Tim knows the design like the back of his hand.   
This version is different. A different shade of red, the black darker. The material seems heavier. There are more hiding spots on the design than Tim ever thought he might need. 

“Wrong universe again, sorry” Red mumbles, already pulling up predictions and schematics on his glove display. He doesn’t seem to care about the Justice league staring at him and standing ready for a fight. He doesn’t seem to even notice the Titans and Outlaws staring at him with suspicion.   
“Who are you?” Superman asks with authority seeping into his very voice.   
“Red Robin. I would say it’s nice to meet you but I already know you. Plus I won’t be around very long, just give me a moment to calibrate” Red says dismissively. He doesn’t even look up from his typing to speak, merely giving a twitch of his hand to wave Superman away.   
Clark looks shocked, not used to being dismissed so easily. 

“Hey. Show some respect to your hosts” Hal Jordan says, his power ring glowing a bright green as he straightens, getting ready for a fight.  
“You aren’t my hosts and I’m not a guest. I’m a passer-by at best, thank you” Red says flatly, glancing up at Hal before his eyes drop again with a disappointed sigh “I was hoping for Jessica. She’s not always as willing to pick a fight as you are” he mutters, not moving even as Hal lunges forward with obvious intent.   
Clark goes to intervene but Hal’s anger manifests easily into a weapon, the construct lashing out at the cause of Hal’s anger. 

The screen of Red’s display flickers once, twice and then dissipates as his glove sparks worryingly.   
Red doesn’t react. Simply stands there and breathes for a few moments.   
Usually, that would be a good thing. But this time, the eery stillness reminds Tim of Bruce just after Jason died.   
He had no idea how apt the description would be. 

“You just ruined my computer” Red says blankly.  
“Fucking hell. Could you show any emotion at all?!” Hal yells out, startling when, a second later, a batarang cuts into the shell o his ear.   
“Could you be any more obnoxious?” Red asks back, now fully focused on Hal as he stalks forward to retrieve the batarang from the wall behind Hall. 

“That batarang sure seems sharp” Jason notes from behind Tim, sounding wary and unsure.   
Red glances up at him and then flicks at the point of the batarang, showing that the edge is sharp enough to cut through Kevlar gloves “Very” is all he says in response, the intonation making it sound like a threat.   
Jason, rightfully, takes it as a threat and stands down, backing up behind Tim with a hand on his holsters. 

The tension in the room ratchets up a degree with that threat made, Red still ignoring all of the metas and Bats at his back as he stares down at the floor.   
“Was that a threat?” Diana asks, the first to voice the question.   
“Yes” is all Red says, lifting his head slightly to look her in the eyes “Yes it was”. 

With that, Diana tenses, laying a hand on her lasso as she takes in Red’s stature. He seems relaxed, but Tim can see the tension in his form, the hunch of his shoulders and the bunching of his muscles. 

“We have to take you into custody then, to ensure that you are not a threat to us” Diana voices, her voice hesitant but clear.   
Red lifts an eyebrow and a small, wry smile appears on his lips.

“You can try” 

Tim moves forward before anyone can take his alternate up on that offer. “Who are you?” he asks, voice neutral even though he knows Red can read the suspicion in his stance. Red meets his eyes before smiling, a raw, angry thing. 

“I’m you. If everything went wrong”

Xxxxxxxxx

Tim tenses the moment the words fall from his alternate’s lips, memories of Batman with Guns coming to the front of his mind as he struggles to keep his breathing even.   
“Before you ask. No, I’m not Him”   
Red smiles at Tim like his teeth are made of broken glass, like showing emotion pains him. 

“Then who are you?” Tim asks again, focused on Red alone now, even as Kon tugs as his cape to pull him back.   
“He was the Tim who lost almost everything. Almost” Red voices, eyes still stuck on Tim’s as the rest of the Titans surge forward.   
They know of Batman with guns, they know how bad that was. And if this dude is implying that he’s worse…

“Almost?” Tim can’t help but ask. 

“He lost his family, yes. But he still had Kon, he still had Bart. He still had Cassie” Red says without remorse, knowing that he would be hurting Tim with every word.   
“And you don’t?” Tim asks quietly, feeing some sympathy for his alternate. 

Red looks up with his eyes meeting everyone’s before he starts laughing. It sounds broken, like the laugh of a man who died long ago. 

“You got them back. Kon and Bart and Bruce. You got them back. And you have no idea how lucky you are for that” Red voices, lifting his head from where he had let it fall as he laughed.   
“My Kon never came back. Neither did Bart” Red says, smiling a broken smile as he meets the eyes of Tim’s previously dead teammates “But that’s the least of it, really” he continues, meeting Tim’s eyes again. 

“My Bruce died while in the time-stream. We think it might have been an early version of the Court of Owls” he continues “Dick had to bury his father twice because we were too late. He kept going out as Batman, kept going with Damian. Kept trying to un-assassin the kid. And it was working. At least until Ra’s al Ghul got involved”   
“Ra’s?” Dick asks quietly, the hand on Damian’s shoulder no longer restraining but rather just a comfort.   
“Ra’s didn’t like that he was taking away his heir, so he killed him” Red says, a quiet lace of grief in his voice. 

Dick freezes, as does everyone else in the room.   
Damian actually takes a step back, barely hiding a wince.   
“Killed him?” Jason asks, the first to recover from shock.   
“I found the body a few hours later, since neither of them were able to manage a distress call” Red explains  
“Them?” Dick asks, sounding almost more scared for the second person then himself.   
Red, for the first time, hesitates “My best guess is that Dick and Damian were out on patrol and were caught off guard by the league. Dick was killed but I think Ra’s took Damian back to Nanda Parbat for…’reprogramming’”  
Damian actually does flinch at that, flinching right into Dick’s chest as Dick wraps an arm around him, staring at Red in horror. 

“You went after them right? You had to’ve had” Dick asks desperately but looks devastated when Red shakes his head.   
“I had no time. Someone started showing up in the Spoiler costume to terrorize people so I had to find out who they were. After all, Stephanie had died months ago. But it turns out. She didn’t really die. She faked her death and then went on a rampage when she recovered as a ‘test’ from Batman” Red says, anger in his voice for the first time in this discussion.   
“Spoiler did her best” Bruce voices from behind Tim, not realizing the minefield that he’s entering.   
Red freezes, body going completely still as he turns his head to look at Batman “She betrayed my trust. Not only did she make me think she was dead, that another person in my family was gone forever. But she also decided that it was alright to torment me. To make me think I was going insane with grief. That I was hallucinating an evil version of my dead ex-girlfriend” he explains, completely deadpan.   
Bruce can’t help but flinch at that, knowing that that is exactly what he did to Tim. But Tim can’t imagine it, can’t imagine Steph doing that when he had just lost everyone. His mom, his dad, Dana, Kon, Bart, Bruce, Dick and effectively Damian. Can’t imagine that he’d be able to forgive her after all of that.   
And Tim can think, privately, that he doesn’t think this Tim did. 

“But that’s it, right?” Kon asks, desperate to think that even though this Tim lived through a lot, he still has something. Anything left. 

“Ha” Red says sarcastically “No. Dick’s death, along with 2 missing members, broke the Titans apart. Split what was left and scattered them to the wind”  
“They wouldn’t. The team was designed to function without any one person” Dick argues.   
“The team was down 2 people, not including me. So 3 people down. Then, Dick, the founder of the Titans and friend of all the original Titans, dies. And with the recent string of deaths involving so many young heroes, there are people in the League that wish to disavow all young heroes” Red explains easily, looking as calm as he could be.   
Dick’s eyes flash with panic. 

“And with the destruction of the Titans, a lot of people didn’t really have any support structure anymore. Cassie was the first to go. She was desperate to do anything. She would have done anything to bring Conner back. And she did. She flew straight into the sun in an attempt to revive him”   
Tim can hear Conner’s voice hitch behind him as Cassie starts breathing heavier. He can almost feel the way his adrenaline response kicks in at the thought of his entire team, dead. 

“What about me? You said that you lost your family but by my estimates, my alternate is still kicking” Jason says loudly, stepping straight into Red’s eyeline.   
At that, Red almost…flinches?   
“You don’t want to hear that story” is all Red says in response, looking away from Jason as if that will help. But Jason is a stubborn bastard and keeps standing.   
“My alternate. I feel like I deserve to know what happened to myself” Jason says, starting to sound angry. 

Red looks up, takes in the way Jason bristles like a cat and narrows his eyes “Fine. You tried taking up the mantle of Batman. You wore the cape and cowl for a while. The league ruined it. We think it was a test of Damian’s reprogramming. You took a dart to the neck that seemed to undo everything the lazarus pit had done” Red spits out.   
Jason just looks confused now “It un-resurrected me?” he asks but stops for a moment to think “Wait. I wasn’t dead when I went into the pit” he voices with trepidation.   
“Alfred sent me out to find you after you didn’t check in at your usual interval. What I found, was a catatonic Jason Todd on a rooftop, not responding to anything at all” Red says, causing Jason to stiffen entirely before he forces himself to relax.   
“That means I’m still alive” Jason refutes but Red just shakes his head.   
“Your body may be alive but there’s nothing left of You. I even called in Constantine to check” Red admits. 

“In the aftermath of…that. Roy didn’t deal all that well. He handed Lian over to Kori and started experimenting with ways to try and bring Jason back” Rec started, causing Jason to tense up even more “It backfired and one of the experiments landed him in the same state”  
Starfire, Roy and Jason all flinch at that, pulling back.   
“Starfire took Lian and took off. No-one quite knows where but I suspect that she’s out in space somewhere, maybe trying to find a cure” Red continues. 

There’s silence for a few moments as everyone digests the horrors spilling from this person. This child’s lips. 

“Me” a voice says from a darkened corner before Cass steps out, decked in full Orphan gear.   
The way Red looks at her is relief, mixed with grief and happiness. It does not bode well for her counterpart.   
“You were Batman. You were the best Batman. The absolute best” Red says, sounding almost reverent as he speaks, however he doesn’t meet her eyes. “But you’ve never been good with large team-ups. Especially not with people who can’t understand sign language.  
The next crisis came around. The league needed Batman. And you went. You just didn’t come back” Red says, sounding remorseful as he admits it to Cass. 

This time the silence is longer, tinged with the knowledge that this version of Tim has lost everyone. 

“So why are you here?” Tim asks, knowing that there has to be a reason. There has to be something keeping this version of him sane.   
Tim remembers what it was like when Conner died. He tried to clone him. He remembers thinking that if Conner didn’t come back, Tim might lose it. But for this version of him, that’s reality.   
There has to be something keeping this Tim going. 

Red glances up at Tim with something like surprise “I’m looking for a universe where the opposite happened” he says faintly.   
But Tim doesn’t understand “What?”  
Red sighs in exasperation before explaining “There are an infinite realm of possibilities in the multiverse. For every decision made, there is a universe where you made the other decision. So there has to be a universe where nobody died but their Tim” he explains. 

And now, now Tim understands. Because he can see himself doing that. Going off to find a universe where he died but nobody else did. 

The league is shocked to silence behind him, Tim’s friends protesting Red’s choice of action, but they can’t see what Tim sees. The resignation. The flatness. The grey setting into Red’s mind.   
If Red has no purpose, then he won’t last long either. Will just be another tragedy.   
And for now, Red does have a purpose. Finding a one-in-a-million universe. 

“Ok” Tim says, meeting Red’s eyes and nodding in approval to his plan. 

Tim can feel his friends shock at his back, silence permeating the air.   
Red meets Tim’s eyes and Tim can see the understanding in them. They both know what would happen if Red stops now.   
Instead, Tim pulls off his glove and hands it to his counterpart. 

After a moment of hesitation, Red takes the glove, running calibrations in silence when no-one but them can understand what’s going on.   
Tim doesn’t feel like explaining it.   
Doesn’t feel like saying that he’s been on that edge Red is on. But Red has already fallen. He’s clinging to a ledge 20 meters from the cliff face and is only clinging because he has something to do.   
Tim refuses to be the one that makes him let go. 

“Thanks” Red says to Tim before he’s swallowed up in a wash of bright light.   
“I hope you find what you’re looking for” is what Tim says back. 

There’s no choice. Red has to find the universe he’s looking for.   
He has to.


End file.
